MUSINGS AND COMMENTARIES FROM A CONSERVATARIAN

Archive for May, 2009

It’s pitifully ironic that Pravda prints what the US media and most Americans wouldn’t dare to even think much less say. There is no visible opposition, no demonstrations, no public disturbances. The tea parties have been a mutual admiration society, too civil to be taken seriously. The American people are not outraged; they are resigned and complacent.

The progressives staged a bloodless coup and succeeded beyond the wiles of their imagination. The progressives waged an ongoing war in education, entertainment, and media and they’ve won; we are now witnessing the effects of their victory.

It’s now too late to defend a country that has already lost the war for its soul. Americans surrendered their free market system to central planners peacefully, without a struggle, nearly oblivious.

So here we stand and here we will remain eating bread and watching the circus for the revolution has been cancelled due to indifference.

It must be said, that like the breaking of a great dam, the American decent into Marxism is happening with breath taking speed, against the back drop of a passive, hapless sheeple, excuse me dear reader, I meant people.

True, the situation has been well prepared on and off for the past century, especially the past twenty years. The initial testing grounds was conducted upon our Holy Russia and a bloody test it was. But we Russians would not just roll over and give up our freedoms and our souls, no matter how much money Wall Street poured into the fists of the Marxists.

Those lessons were taken and used to properly prepare the American populace for the surrender of their freedoms and souls, to the whims of their elites and betters.

First, the population was dumbed down through a politicized and substandard education system based on pop culture, rather then the classics. Americans know more about their favorite TV dramas then the drama in DC that directly affects their lives. They care more for their “right” to choke down a McDonalds burger or a BurgerKing burger than for their constitutional rights. Then they turn around and lecture us about our rights and about our “democracy”. Pride blind the foolish.

Then their faith in God was destroyed, until their churches, all tens of thousands of different “branches and denominations” were for the most part little more then Sunday circuses and their televangelists and top protestant mega preachers were more then happy to sell out their souls and flocks to be on the “winning” side of one pseudo Marxist politician or another. Their flocks may complain, but when explained that they would be on the “winning” side, their flocks were ever so quick to reject Christ in hopes for earthly power. Even our Holy Orthodox churches are scandalously liberalized in America.

The final collapse has come with the election of Barack Obama. His speed in the past three months has been truly impressive. His spending and money printing has been a record setting, not just in America’s short history but in the world. If this keeps up for more then another year, and there is no sign that it will not, America at best will resemble the Wiemar Republic and at worst Zimbabwe.

These past two weeks have been the most breath taking of all. First came the announcement of a planned redesign of the American Byzantine tax system, by the very thieves who used it to bankroll their thefts, loses and swindles of hundreds of billions of dollars. These make our Russian oligarchs look little more then ordinary street thugs, in comparison. Yes, the Americans have beat our own thieves in the shear volumes. Should we congratulate them?

These men, of course, are not an elected panel but made up of appointees picked from the very financial oligarchs and their henchmen who are now gorging themselves on trillions of American dollars, in one bailout after another. They are also usurping the rights, duties and powers of the American congress (parliament). Again, congress has put up little more then a whimper to their masters.

Then came Barack Obama’s command that GM’s (General Motor) president step down from leadership of his company. That is correct, dear reader, in the land of “pure” free markets, the American president now has the power, the self given power, to fire CEOs and we can assume other employees of private companies, at will. Come hither, go dither, the centurion commands his minions.

So it should be no surprise, that the American president has followed this up with a “bold” move of declaring that he and another group of unelected, chosen stooges will now redesign the entire automotive industry and will even be the guarantee of automobile policies. I am sure that if given the chance, they would happily try and redesign it for the whole of the world, too. Prime Minister Putin, less then two months ago, warned Obama and UK’s Blair, not to follow the path to Marxism, it only leads to disaster. Apparently, even though we suffered 70 years of this Western sponsored horror show, we know nothing, as foolish, drunken Russians, so let our “wise” Anglo-Saxon fools find out the folly of their own pride.

Again, the American public has taken this with barely a whimper…but a “freeman” whimper.

So, should it be any surprise to discover that the Democratically controlled Congress of America is working on passing a new regulation that would give the American Treasury department the power to set “fair” maximum salaries, evaluate performance and control how private companies give out pay raises and bonuses? Senator Barney Franks, a social pervert basking in his homosexuality (of course, amongst the modern, enlightened American societal norm, as well as that of the general West, homosexuality is not only not a looked down upon life choice, but is often praised as a virtue) and his Marxist enlightenment, has led this effort. He stresses that this only affects companies that receive government monies, but it is retroactive and taken to a logical extreme, this would include any company or industry that has ever received a tax break or incentive.

The Russian owners of American companies and industries should look thoughtfully at this and the option of closing their facilities down and fleeing the land of the Red as fast as possible. In other words, divest while there is still value left.

The proud American will go down into his slavery with out a fight, beating his chest and proclaiming to the world, how free he really is. The world will only snicker.

The citizens of Montana have struck the first blow in a fight to stop the federal government’s tyranny and totalitarian control over the states. The newly adopted Montana Firearms Freedom Act (HB246) is a declaration to diffuse political power, reduce tyranny, and protect individual rights; it demands that federal bureaucracies back off and allow state governments to deal with state problems; it restrains despotism and the federal government’s long train of abuses and usurpations; it proclaims the state’s right to throw off the power of a centralized government and provide a new guard to secure the individual rights of its residents.

After years of frustration and listening to gibberish from placating politicians, the citizens of Montana have thrown down the gauntlet for a showdown between their state and the federal government. The state’s new law contends that guns manufactured and sold in Montana to people who intend to keep them in the state are exempt from federal firearms laws given that the Constitution limits the power of the federal government to control only commerce across state lines. This means that any gun manufactured and kept in Montana is free from federal gun registrations, background checks, and dealer-licensing rules.

Montana’s new law is not just another populist idea in the long line of toothless Taxed Enough Already (TEA) party protests and non-binding resolutions demanding Tenth Amendment protections; this law creates an actual pushback point against the 1942 interpretation of the Interstate Commerce Clause and the subsequent overreaching powers of the federal government. The main purpose for Montana’s law is not about extending gun rights; “it’s about state rights” and demonstrating state sovereignty.

In the past, the federal government has claimed authority to regulate guns under the Commerce Clause arguing that guns can be easily transported across state lines. Montana’s new law challenges the federal government to enforce its firearms acts or risk the door being open for further Tenth Amendment challenges that could significantly reduce the size and scope of the federal government.

Now that the bill has been signed into law, what is needed to ignite the legal battle with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (BATFE) is for a Montana resident with a spotless criminal record to notify the BATFE of his intention to build and sell several youth-model single-shot, bolt-action .22-caliber rifles without a federal dealership license. If BATFE rules that federal laws prohibit him from doing so, the state will file a law suit and the battle contesting the federal government’s regulatory authority begins.

The fly in the ointment is that the federal government can also use tax laws to regulate firearms, a potential quagmire that makes the outcome of the new law uncertain. But the drafters of the law are hopeful that the rising tide toward federalism will break states free from Leviathan’s talons.

Since the court’s 1942 Commerce Clause decision, all states have been denied their rights under the Tenth Amendment, but more and more Americans and state lawmakers are becoming outraged that the Framers original intent of delegated powers to the states is being usurped by an ever-expanding centralized federal government. Drawing strength and encouragement from TEA party protests and Tenth Amendment state sovereignty movements, the drafters of the Montana law think the time has come to strengthen federalism again in this nation.

Montana’s Firearms Freedom Act may prove to be the straw that breaks the back of centralized government, but it will take a unified coalition of at least two-thirds of the states to make the federal courts ignore the labyrinth of conflicting state laws and recognize the people’s position regarding the Tenth Amendment.

If enough states act in concert, Congress and the President would be forced to acknowledge that American voters want the Tenth Amendment honored. Such a coalition of state legislatures would create a Tenth Amendment hegemony that would stymie the progressives and the Democrat Party long enough for the floodgates of freedom to open.

It has become très très chic among America’s progressive media and celebrity culture to ridicule Americans who oppose the centralized power of the encroaching Nanny State. But for many Americans who live outside the bubbled confines of the pampered progressive elitist class, snobbish distain for the Tenth Amendment is no laughing matter. They don’t think it’s funny when the President and a majority in Congress continue to blatantly disregard the enumerated powers of the Constitution, tacitly ignore the overreaching powers of the federal government, and brazenly rob them of their wealth, rights, and freedoms.’

Congress, the President, and their media lackeys and celebrity sycophants have been acting as ruling elites who don’t seem to remember that the states created the federal government to serve the will of the states, not the other way around. But now that Montana’s new law has jogged their memories a bit, Americans can only hope that it will also serve to wipe away the smirks and to silence the snide remarks from the progressive pompous posh narcissists in the media and entertainment industry.

The citizens of Montana have struck the first blow in a fight to stop the federal government’s tyranny and totalitarian control over the states. The newly adopted Montana Firearms Freedom Act (HB246) is a declaration to diffuse political power, reduce tyranny, and protect individual rights; it demands that federal bureaucracies back off and allow state governments to deal with state problems; it restrains despotism and the federal government’s long train of abuses and usurpations; it proclaims the state’s right to throw off the power of a centralized government and provide a new guard to secure the individual rights of its residents.

After years of frustration and listening to gibberish from placating politicians, the citizens of Montana have thrown down the gauntlet for a showdown between their state and the federal government. The state’s new law contends that guns manufactured and sold in Montana to people who intend to keep them in the state are exempt from federal firearms laws given that the Constitution limits the power of the federal government to control only commerce across state lines. This means that any gun manufactured and kept in Montana is free from federal gun registrations, background checks, and dealer-licensing rules.

Montana’s new law is not just another populist idea in the long line of toothless Taxed Enough Already (TEA) party protests and non-binding resolutions demanding Tenth Amendment protections; this law creates an actual pushback point against the 1942 interpretation of the Interstate Commerce Clause and the subsequent overreaching powers of the federal government. The main purpose for Montana’s law is not about extending gun rights; “it’s about state rights” and demonstrating state sovereignty.

In the past, the federal government has claimed authority to regulate guns under the Commerce Clause arguing that guns can be easily transported across state lines. Montana’s new law challenges the federal government to enforce its firearms acts or risk the door being open for further Tenth Amendment challenges that could significantly reduce the size and scope of the federal government.

Now that the bill has been signed into law, what is needed to ignite the legal battle with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) is for a Montana resident with a spotless criminal record to notify the ATF of his intention to build and sell several youth-model single-shot, bolt-action .22-caliber rifles without a federal dealership license. If ATF rules that federal laws prohibit him from doing so, the state will file a law suit and the battle contesting the federal government’s regulatory authority begins.

The fly in the ointment is that the federal government can also use tax laws to regulate firearms, a potential quagmire that makes the outcome of the new law uncertain. But the drafters of the law are hopeful that the rising tide toward federalism will break states free from Leviathan’s talons.

Since the court’s 1942 Commerce Clause decision, all states have been denied their rights under the Tenth Amendment, but more and more Americans and state lawmakers are becoming outraged that the Framers original intent of delegated powers to the states is being usurped by an ever-expanding centralized federal government. Drawing strength and encouragement from TEA party protests and Tenth Amendment state sovereignty movements, the drafters of the Montana law think the time has come to strengthen federalism again in this nation.

Montana’s Firearms Freedom Act may prove to be the straw that breaks the back of centralized government, but it will take a unified coalition of at least two-thirds of the states to make the federal courts ignore the labyrinth of conflicting state laws and recognize the people’s position regarding the Tenth Amendment.

If enough states act in concert, Congress and the President would be forced to acknowledge that American voters want the Tenth Amendment honored. Such a coalition of state legislatures would create a Tenth Amendment hegemony that would stymie the progressives and the Democrat Party long enough for the floodgates of freedom to open.

It has become très très chic among America’s progressive media and celebrity culture to ridicule Americans who oppose the centralized power of the encroaching Nanny State. But for many Americans who live outside the bubbled confines of the pampered progressive elitist class, snobbish distain for the Tenth Amendment is no laughing matter. They don’t think it’s funny when the President and a majority in Congress continue to blatantly disregard the enumerated powers of the Constitution, tacitly ignore the overreaching powers of the federal government, and brazenly rob them of their wealth, rights, and freedoms.

Congress, the President, and their media lackeys and celebrity sycophants have been acting as ruling elites who don’t seem to remember that the states created the federal government to serve the will of the states, not the other way around. But now that Montana’s new law has jogged their memories a bit, Americans can only hope that it will also serve to wipe away the smirks and to silence the snide remarks from the progressive pompous posh farts in the media and entertainment industry.

“Water, water everywhere nor any drop” that won’t be controlled by the progressives in Washington, DC. Your Big Brother in Washington, who decrees what’s best for all Americans, now wants to “clarify the jurisdiction of the United States over [all] waters of the United States.” Isn’t that special?

Democrat Russell Feingold’s draconian measure would not just give Congress power to dictate what a farmer can do with a duck pond or cistern, it would regulate water used by all Americans for drinking, cooking, bathing, and home gardening. Finegold’s bill, combined with the recent Food Safety Modernization Act, would mean that Americans will eat and drink at the pleasure of the government.

The hate crime bill that passed the U.S. House of Representatives April 29 is an attempt by democratic socialists and progressives to silence dissent against alternative lifestyles. Their incessant iconoclastic attacks on once established values and morality have nearly eroded this nation’s spiritual and cultural legacy. Instituting same-sex marriage and prosecuting hate speech will complete the process and shatter the remaining hopes for cultural regeneration and tear down the last vestiges of the country’s Judeo-Christian ethic.

Under the guise of tolerance, Canada and European countries have implemented hate crimes legislation to suppress expressions that conflict with public opinion or do not conform to politically-correct policies, i.e., the views of the state are the views of the people. Only designated groups and minorities belong to the protected classes. The majority of Canadians and Europeans are not free to express politically incorrect religious beliefs, moral convictions, and political ideas publicly for fear they may enrage members in the protected classes.

Britain’s hate crimes legislation should be renamed the Islam Protection Act. In January 2007, British television aired Undercover Mosque, a documentary about Islamic extremism in Britain. The documentary was based on a 12-month secret investigation into mosques throughout the nation. In the footage, Muslim preachers exhort followers to prepare for jihad, incite violence against non-Muslims, urge followers to reject British laws, and praise the Taliban for killing a British soldier.

Leaders in the Muslim community complained the film was discriminatory and intimidating, so the police requested that the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) prosecute the film-makers for “stirring up racial hatred.” By ignoring facts and what had actually happened, the police and CPS found common ground with the film’s detractors — that is to say, they agreed the Islamic clerics were harmless victims whose sermons were “taken out of context” and condemned the film-makers for religious bigotry and inciting racial hatred. Alas, clairvoyance has supplanted the blindfolded matron, Lady Justice.

Hate crimes legislation allows a country’s legal system to disregard any notion of equality under the law, and apply it unequally and selectively, which means that some citizens are harassed, prosecuted, and convicted, while others are not. In Canada and European countries, hate crime prosecutions of heterosexuals, non-Muslims, or non-Socialists exceed those of homosexuals, Muslims, and socialists.

Hate crime laws are rarely enforced when slurs, insults, invectives, and ridicule are hurled at members in the majority group. For example, in May 2006, a Belgium man filed a complaint with the police against the Center for Equal Opportunities and Opposition to Racism because he was offended by the agency’s use of the words “Dirty Heterosexual” in its postcard distribution campaign. The agency director said that stigmatizing or discriminating against majorities is “not real discrimination” and dismissed the man’s objections with laugher saying, “Discrimination is something that by definition affects minorities.”

Hate crime laws establish a preferential justice system and create a double standard in the legal system that fosters distrust, conflict, and intolerance in a society. Such laws suggest that members of a minority group deserve a higher level of justice than those of the majority, which makes members of the minority group more important and morally superior. In Austria, it’s not considered degrading to Christians if Jesus is portrayed in homosexual acts with his apostles, but it is degrading to Muslims if the historical fact that Muhammad married a six-year old girl is mentioned.

In Britain, a 69-year-old evangelical was prosecuted for displaying a protest sign with the words “Stop Immorality. Stop Homosexuality. Stop Lesbianism.” Objecting to his peaceful protest, hecklers knocked him down, threw dirt on him, poured water over his head, and tried to take his placard. The police came and arrested the protester, but did nothing to those who assaulted him.

The magistrates’ court ruled that the words on the placard could be harassing, alarming, and distressful for homosexuals who may find the words threatening, abusive, or insulting. Consequently, the evangelical protester was fined and ordered to pay court costs for displaying words that might offend the delicate sensibilities of a protected class member, but the criminal actions of the hecklers who assaulted him were disregarded and left unpunished.

Fears that hate crime laws will eventually lead to criminalizing speech are not unfounded. In 2001, a Saskatchewan resident published an ad in a local newspaper that consisted of a few Bible verses and an illustration of two stickman figures holding hands inside a circle with a line though it. The Saskatchewan Human Rights Tribunal ordered the resident and newspaper to pay $4,500 to three homosexuals who had been traumatized and scarred for life by the stickman illustration.

Polemicists who denounce homosexuality and same-sex marriage are no less entitled to their opinions than the apologists who promote them. What has happened to religious freedom and freedom of conscience in Canada and Europe as the result of implementing hate crime laws is clear. Make no mistake, if the recently passed hate crime bill becomes law in the United States, freedom of speech will be sacrificed to protect particular classes from criticism and all forms of upset, making condemnation of homosexuality illegal.

April is the cruellest month stirring desires to renew a withered, decaying civilization amid a waste land of broken traditions and dead flowing crowds, which are but painful reminders of a once fertile culture. Winter’s forgetfulness and numbness is preferable to America’s uninhibited vulgarity, shocking sensationalism, and extreme eccentricities.

The democratic socialists’ and progressives’ incessant iconoclastic attacks on once established values and morality have nearly eroded this nation’s spiritual and cultural legacy. Instituting same-sex marriage and prosecuting hate speech will complete the process and emasculate the wounded Fisher King, shatter the remaining hopes for cultural regeneration, and tear down the last vestiges of the country’s Judeo-Christian ethic.

Under the guise of tolerance, Canada and European countries have implemented hate crimes legislation to suppress expressions that conflict with public opinion or do not conform to politically-correct policies, i.e., the views of the state are the views of the people. Only designated groups and minorities belong to the protected classes. The majority of Canadians and Europeans are not free to express politically incorrect religious beliefs, moral convictions, and political ideas publicly for fear they may enrage members in the protected classes.

Britain’s hate crimes legislation should be renamed the Islam Protection Act. In January 2007, British television aired Undercover Mosque, a documentary about Islamic extremism in Britain. The documentary was based on a 12-month secret investigation into mosques throughout the nation. In the footage, Muslim preachers exhort followers to prepare for jihad, incite violence against non-Muslims, urge followers to reject British laws, and praise the Taliban for killing a British soldier.

Leaders in the Muslim community complained the film was discriminatory and intimidating, so the police requested the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) prosecute the film-makers for “stirring up racial hatred.” By ignoring facts and what had actually happened, the police and CPS found common ground with the film’s detractors—that is to say, they agreed the Islamic clerics were harmless victims whose sermons were “taken out of context” and condemned the film-makers for religious bigotry and inciting racial hatred. Alas, the Sibyl hanging in a jar has supplanted the blindfolded matron, Justitia.

Hate crimes legislation allows a country’s legal system to disregard any notion of equality under the law, and apply it unequally and selectively, which means that some citizens are harassed, prosecuted, and convicted, while others are not. In Canada and European countries, hate crime prosecutions of heterosexuals, non-Muslims, or non-Socialists exceed those of homosexuals, Muslims, and socialists.

Hate crime laws are rarely enforced when slurs, insults, invectives, and ridicule are hurled at members in the majority group. For example, in May 2006, a Belgium man filed a complaint with the police against the Center for Equal Opportunities and Opposition to Racism because he was offended by the agency’s use of the words “Dirty Heterosexual” in its postcard distribution campaign. The agency director said that stigmatizing or discriminating against majorities is “not real discrimination” and dismissed the man’s objections with laugher saying, “Discrimination is something that by definition affects minorities.”

Hate crime laws establish a preferential justice system and create a double standard in the legal system that fosters distrust, conflict, and intolerance in a society. Such laws suggest that members of a minority group deserve a higher tier of justice than those of the majority, which makes members of the minority group more important and morally superior. In Austria, it’s not considered degrading to Christians if Jesus is portrayed in homosexual acts with his apostles, but it is degrading to Muslims if the historical fact that Muhammad married a six-year old girl is mentioned.

In Britain, a 69-year-old evangelical was prosecuted for displaying a protest sign with the words “Stop Immorality. Stop Homosexuality. Stop Lesbianism.” Objecting to his peaceful protest, hecklers knocked him down, threw dirt on him, poured water over his head, and tried to take his placard. The police came and arrested the protester, but did nothing to those who assaulted him.

The magistrates’ court ruled that the words on the placard could be harassing, alarming, and distressful for homosexuals who may find the words threatening, abusive, or insulting. Consequently, the evangelical protester was fined and ordered to pay court costs for displaying words that might offend the delicate sensibilities of a protected class member, but the criminal actions of the hecklers who assaulted him were disregarded and left unpunished.

Fears that hate crime laws will eventually lead to criminalizing speech are not unfounded. In 2001, a Saskatchewan resident published an ad in a local newspaper that consisted of a few Bible verses and an illustration of two stickman figures holding hands inside a circle with a line though it. Now, “I will show you fear in a handful of dust.” The Saskatchewan Human Rights Tribunal ordered the resident and newspaper to pay $4,500 to three homosexuals who had been traumatized and scarred for life by the stickman illustration.

Polemicists who denounce homosexuality and same-sex marriage are no less entitled to their opinions than the apologists who promote them. What has happened to religious freedom and freedom of conscience in Canada and Europe as the result of implementing hate crime laws is clear. “I had not thought death had undone so many.” Make no mistake, if HR-1913 becomes law in the United States, freedom of speech will be sacrificed to protect particular classes from criticism and all forms of upset, making condemnation of homosexuality illegal.

Striding and rising shadows depend on the time of day, but self-evident truth is a constant. Hate crime laws violate the Founder’s fundamental notion that man’s natural equality entitles him to impartial justice, which is the underlying principle of the Constitution and Bill of Rights.